Wind turbine location suitability
Introduction
With the growing expansion of the city Ottawa energy capacity requirements become an integral issue. Currently the Energy Ottawa Company supplies 100% of its energy to the city through what is known as the ‘run-of-the-river’ generating system. This is a series of small scale hydroelectric dam facilities spread out across the regions watershed (Energy Ottawa, 2010).
This method of energy generation is considered by some as a green means of producing energy as it does not typically involve emitting pollution into the atmosphere such as coal, petroleum, natural gas, and other popular generation methods. What is often overlooked is the negative affects that hydroelectric dams pose to the health of watershed, impacting many aspects of both the natural and social environment. These adverse affects have caused the number of hydroelectric dams being built to be drastically reduced in Canada (Natural Resources Canada [NRC], 2009).
This has led many governments to seek alternative green energy production techniques. As such wind energy has come to the forefront of this search. Wind energy is however not without its negative implications as well. Recent studies have been produced in which attribute the construction of wind farms as causing degradation the environment in sensitive areas, as well as possibly having negative implications to human health with prolonged exposure in close proximity to wind turbines. To mediate these concerns the provincial government of Ontario has released various restrictions, limiting areas in which the construction of wind farms is permitted.
Map of suitable sites for wind energy production in Ottawa, Ward 21
Objective
The objective of this tutorial is to demonstrate a technique which identifies spatial regions deemed as potentially suitable locations for the development of wind energy production. This will display means for consideration of the restrictions imposed by the provincial government to evaluate the purposed region.
Restrictions
The Provincial Government of Ontario has provided the following restrictions in relation the spatial placement of wind energy turbines for use of commercial applications:
- 135m from all existing public roadways
- 135m from all existing railway lines
- 1000m from all existing power lines
*These restrictions are relative to the turbine specifications of the Vestas V90, 3 megawatt model
These restrictions were provided by:
- Renewable Energy Approvals
- Technical Bulletin Six: Required Setbacks for Wind Turbines
- Drafted by the Environmental Registry March 1, 2010
Methods
The following will thoroughly demonstrate the techniques involved in this approach for identifying suitable wind energy production sites in the Ottawa city area. This example looks to specifically examine Ward 21, Rideau within the region.
Data Used
The first step is to gather all necessary data appropriate for the purpose of this exercise. This example uses vector shapefiles which include:
- Ottawa area boundry
- Ottawa city wards boundary
- Power lines
- Railways
- Federal Roads
- Provincial Roads
- Regional Roads
Software Used
The exercises demonstrated are completed using the GRASS Toolset in the Quantum GIS software interface. These are open source software materials which are freely accessible and available online. For new users it is suggested to use the standalone installer.
This is available at http://www.qgis.org/wiki/Download
This is based on the OSGeo4W packages and includes the newest version of qGIS (1.6.0) as well as the GRASS toolset which will be used throughout this tutorial.
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